COVID-19 Minnesota Weekly Forecast Summary

Background

This report provides a brief summary of the weekly ensemble forecast for Minnesota from the COVID-19 Forecast Hub. In collaboration with the US CDC, our team aggregates COVID-19 forecasts from dozens of teams around the globe. Typically on Wednesday of each week, a summary of the week's forecasts from the COVID-19 Forecast Hub appear on the official CDC COVID-19 forecasting page.

Every week, teams submit their forecasts to the COVID-19 Forecast Hub.

Each Tuesday, we combine the most recent forecasts from each team into a single "ensemble" forecast of reported COVID-19 cases at the county, state, and national level and deaths at the state and national level. At the moment, we only generate ensemble forecasts for up to four weeks into the future, as the available evidence suggests that models are less accurate at longer forecast horizons.

Weekly reports from the COVID-19 Forecast Hub can be found at this page.

COVID-19 Forecasts

Since the inputs to the ensemble model do not factor in changes in behavior or policy that could have an impact on short-term disease transmission (e.g. school openings or closures, new interventions, governmental policy shift, etc...), the ensemble model itself should not be looked to for specific answers to questions like "what will happen if or when schools open in 2 weeks" because most of the input models are not factoring in these changes. That said, the ensemble model has consistently shown strong predictive performance in predicting mortality, and very few of the many interventions put in place appear to have created dramatic changes in short-term disease transmission that would impact short-term trends in mortality.

State level

This week, our ensemble combined forecasts for Minnesota from 30 different models.

During periods of relative stability, models in general show broad agreement about the predicted trajectory of the outbreak. However, when there are steep surges or declines in cases or deaths, models often have quite different predictions for the upcoming weeks. The result is that there is increased uncertainty in the ensemble forecast, which can be seen as wider confidence intervals in the forecast visualization. You can explore the full set of models, including their forecasts for past weeks online at the Forecast Hub interactive visualization.

When interpreting probability of an increase, it's important to note that the increase or decrease is relative to the location-specific recent observed incidence, which varies across locations.

Deaths

At the state level, the ensemble model predicts that weekly totals of observed deaths in each of the next four weeks will be between 42 and 45 deaths each week with around 13,420 total deaths by August 20, 2022. However for the week ending August 20, 2022, the ensemble shows substantial uncertainty, with observed deaths between 10 and 90 deemed possible (95% prediction interval: 9 - 89).

For state-level death forecasts made over the last 6 weeks in Minnesota for which observed data are now available, the 95% prediction intervals covered the truth 94% of the time, and the 50% prediction intervals covered the truth 66% of the time.

The sortable and searchable death table below shows the total number of reported COVID-19 deaths at the US level and state level for Minnesota as of Saturday, July 23, 2022 ("Total COVID-19 Deaths") as well as the rate of reported COVID-19 deaths in the population (standardized per 100,000 population) over the last two weeks and over the next two weeks.

Hospitalizations

As of September 28, 2021 the ensemble forecast only reports 14 day ahead forecasts for hospitalizations, due to persistent large inaccuracies observed when forecasting beyond that.

The ensemble model predicts that COVID-19 daily hospitalizations will be between 66 and 71 hospitalizations daily. However for August 08, 2022, the ensemble shows substantial uncertainty, with COVID-19 daily hospitalizations between 27 and 154 deemed possible.

For state-level hospitalization forecasts made over the last 6 weeks in Minnesota for which observed data are now available, the 95% prediction intervals covered the truth 100% of the time, and the 50% prediction intervals covered the truth 90% of the time.

The sortable and searchable hospitalization table below shows the 7 day average hospitalization count and rate of reported COVID-19 hospitalization in the population (standardized per 100,000 population) over the last week (July 17, 2022 to July 23, 2022) and two weeks ahead (July 31, 2022 to August 06, 2022).

Cases

As of September 28, 2021 the ensemble forecast only reports one-week ahead forecasts for cases, due to persistent large inaccuracies observed when forecasting beyond that.

For the week ending July 30, 2022, the ensemble forecasts that reported COVID-19 cases in the US will be between 4,600 and 18,400 (95% prediction interval: 4,582 - 18,361).

For state-level case forecasts made over the last 6 weeks in Minnesota for which observed data are now available, the 95% prediction intervals covered the truth 100% of the time, and the 50% prediction intervals covered the truth 66% of the time.

Figure 2: Weekly observed and forecasted COVID-19 cases. Observed data from JHU CSSE and forecasts from the COVID-19 Forecast Hub.

The sortable and searchable case table below shows the weekly case count and rate of reported COVID-19 case in the population (standardized per 100,000 population) over the last week (July 17, 2022 to July 23, 2022) and one week ahead (July 24, 2022 to July 30, 2022).

County level

County-level forecasts are only made for cases. County-level case forecasts are presented below.

Cases reported in unknown counties or by people who reside outside of the state are not included in Table 3, but are included in the state-level data.

Select a County

The sortable and searchable table below shows the total number of reported COVID-19 cases at the county level for Minnesota as of Saturday,July 23, 2022 ("Total COVID-19 Cases") as well as the rate of reported COVID-19 cases in the population (standardized per 100,000 population) over the last two weeks and over the next two weeks.

For county-level case forecasts made over the last 6 weeks in Minnesota for which observed data are now available, the 95% prediction intervals covered the truth 100% of the time and the 50% prediction intervals covered the truth 66% of the time.

Looking at the rates allows for easier comparison across counties, where you can see which counties have had or are predicted to have propoportionally higher rates in comparison to other counties. These tables calculate the weekly case count and rate of reported COVID-19 cases in the population (standardized per 100,000 population) over the last week(July 17, 2022 to July 23, 2022) and two weeks ahead (July 24, 2022 to July 30, 2022).

When interpreting probability of an increase, it's important to note that the increase or decrease is relative to the location-specific recent observed incidence, which varies across locations.

Methods & Acknowledgement

This report was reproducibly and dynamically generated using RMarkdown. The code for the report can be found here.